Written & Directed by Olivier Ducastel & Jacques Martineau
30 Second Bottom Line: A captivating road trip through the French countryside with an attractive and likable young gay man in search of his father, whom he's never met. Along the way he embraces various people he meets while confronting many of his personal issues with humor and poignancy.
Story Line: Felix (Sami Bouajila) is the picture of jaunty sophistication as he pedals his bike near the sea, singing along with an appealing tune circling in his head. You wouldn't necessarily think that he's been laid off from his job, but that's the case as he tells his striking co-workers. Spring holiday is about to begin, a time for new beginnings and Felix has plans. The next morning, Felix tells his boyfriend Daniel (Pierre-Loup Rajot) that he's going to clear out his deceased mother's apartment for sale, and travel from their northern hometown of Dieppe, France to Marseilles in the south, to meet his father for the first time. Daniel, a schoolteacher, is to join Felix there in about a week.
In preparation for the trip Felix visits his doctor at the HIV clinic to make sure his medications are sufficient. He is on a tri-therapy regimen, three times a day. A humorous episode occurs in the waiting room as HIV patients discuss their various therapeutic configurations.
Felix is determined to make this journey unencumbered by train schedules or other restraints. He allows himself the adventure of hitchhiking and walking, encountering others on their own particular journeys. When lives intersect, anything can happen and Felix is a person who is open to possibilities.
One possibility is most unpleasant. Felix witnesses a crime and he is pursued and beaten by the perpetrator. All the factors of his existence come into play; he is alone, he has no job, he is gay and HIV positive, and he is mixed race. Felix's mother was white and his father is North African. His assailant taunts him with, "No one will believe an Arab, so get lost." What will he do faced with this dilemma?
We watch as Felix creates his own family of distinct characters whose paths join with his for a brief time. He can temporarily put the issue of what to do aside. Each encounter is titled for us as Felix makes his way from North to South. In "My Little Brother" he meets Jules (Charly Sergue), the younger brother he might have had and with whom he tries to share a life lesson, then realizes we each have to learn on our own. A charming interlude with a woman who could have been his grandmother, Mathilde, portrayed with graceful earthiness and honesty by Patachou, takes place in a country cottage with a garden full of old plantings, begging for the French sun. This stands in contrast to a brief sensual encounter with a rakish railroad worker (Philippe Garziano)-a kissing cousin?-out for a romp in a field of yellow flowers. Isabelle (Ariane Ascaride), a free spirited woman traveling with three children in a small van, agrees to give Felix a ride in exchange for his changing a tire. Her children, by three different fathers, are off to spend the weekend with each of their dads. Isabelle could certainly be that older sister that Felix has never known.
When he reaches Marseilles, Felix meets a fisherman (Maurice Benichou) who simply loves to fish, with no expectation of a good catch. Could this be how Felix might have spent time with his father? It's the fishing, not the catching; as with Felix, it's the journey, not the destination.
There are many decisions to be made in Marseilles; the crime and his father among them.
Tell Me More About It: Social commentary is cleverly woven into this script. There's no preaching and there're plenty of smiles. Felix is a man comfortable in his own skin, seemingly at peace with his medical condition, happy in a love relationship but perhaps wanting to set right in his mind who the man is who loved his mother and than left both of them.
The cast is superb. Sami Bouajila, born in Grenoble, France, strikes the perfect pitch with Felix. He gives a self-assured performance with vulnerability being the key. Patachou's personality is enchanting as a wise older woman, very much alive in her life. Ariane Ascaride is delightfully off center as a mother with children who exhibit a very funny daddy fixation. Thinking of this film reminds me a little of Straight Story with differences in age, location and purpose of a road trip which brings one into contact with strangers that change your life and/or theirs.
DVD